The Chronotron Returns
by auroraminamino
Summary: Somethings differnt, somethings not right. This is the feeling that wakes Kowalski up one morning. The problem is that nothing seems wrong. Everyone and everything is where its supposed to be right? Kowalski isn't so sure. Paranoia or something more?


**The Chronotron Returns**

**~OR~**

**An Alternate Time Line**

Kowalski was sleeping in the topmost bunk on his back. He looked a bit unsettled, as his face was scrunched up and his wings twitched slightly. Suddenly he took a deep breath, opened his eyes and had to fight the compulsion to sit bolt upright as he didn't want to slam his head on the ceiling of the space he was in. He took another deep calming breath before he sat up just enough to see the rest of the room: Skipper was on one side of the room dressed up in his cowboy outfit and looking at himself in the mirror, Rico was making his secret recipe sushi and Private was watching one of his favorite unicorn themed TV shows.

"Nothing out of the ordinary." he thought tilting his head. He couldn't help thinking that as the feeling that something was off had just woken him up, but nothing seemed wrong. Just then Skipper saw him in his mirror.

He turned around and said "Good thing that today is a day off soldier. Wow, did you take your sweet time waking up." Skipper then grinned at him.

Kowalski chuckled lightly: "Good Morning to you too Skipper." He then jumped down from his bunk and walked over to see how the sushi was coming. Rico grinned at him, but didn't say anything. The tall penguin then seemed to wonder around the room for a moment. He stopped when he was behind Private. He looked at the show for a moment without really seeing it.

Private felt him standing there and looked up at him. "Everything alright Kowalski?" he asked

"Seems to be." Kowalski said with a shrug. "Why?"

"You just look a bit out of sorts is all." Private answered

"Thats for sure." said Skipper using his mirror to look at him. Kowalski shrugged again.

"I'm going to clean up the lab I think." he said as he walked towards the hallway door.

"Alright then, we'll save you some breakfast." said Private

"Thanks." Kowalski said before walking the rest of the way to one of his favorite locations. He sighed when he got into the laboratory because of how messy it had gotten in recent days. Constant experiments and more then a few missions left little time for tidiness. Not to mention the training Skipper had them doing lately. The entire team was glad for the day off. Kowalski was just a bit annoyed that said day was tainted with the feeling that something was wrong. Though as far as he could tell he was the only one feeling this way. Could it be that he was becoming even more paranoid then Skipper? "Oh, what a horrifying thought." Kowalski said to himself as he picked up various tools and began putting them into there proper place. He then tried to shake off the paranoid type feeling, yet it turned out to be quite persistent.

After he made sure that all of his hardware was in place he decided to go have some breakfast and get some air. He'd finish the lab clean up later. There were some files strewn around, along with some designs of yet to be built gadgets that came to him on the fly that he just jotted down quickly. Also it was a bit dusty. He left the lab, ate his share of breakfast and went topside to join the others. After putting the fish dish back over the hatch he looked across the way at another habitat and its occupant. Alex The Lion, King Of New York was on top of his platform practicing his back flips. Kowalski stared at Alex.

Rico noticed that he was staring at him as if he had never seen him before. "Thats weird." thought Rico "We see the lion every day." Rico then wondered if The options guy had finely lost it completely, funny Rico always thought that he himself would be the first to go, as close to insanity as he always was normally. He watched as Kowalski walked to the edge of the island, barely stopping in time to not walk straight off the edge. Rico blinked at him.

"Huh, hes getting good at that. Good thing I gave him pointers the other day." said Skipper waking Kowalski slightly from the odd trance he was in.

Alex was standing up on one of his front paws when he saw that he was being watched. He waved at Kowalski with his free paw, being careful not to disrupt his balance. Kowalski slowly waved back, looking oddly confused. Alex tilted his head slightly as he thought: "Whats up with him?"

"Kowalski, thats Alex. You know Alex don't you?" Private asked suddenly. Like Rico, he had noticed his odd behavior. Kowalski snapped out of his trance completely this time and turned to look at Private. He didn't get a chance to answer him though.

"Kowalski?" Alex was now standing at the penguins perimeter fence. Good thing it was the weekend, as the zoo opened a bit later in the day. Kowalski turned and looked at him now. "Are you alright man because you look really weird."

"Uh yeah. I'm fine." he said with a half hearted shrug.

"Hes been a bit out of sorts this morning. We are not sure why." said Private

"I'm not even sure why myself to be honest." said Kowalski shrugging again.

"Well, bye the looks of things Skipper gave you guys a day off. Most of you being as relaxed as you are. So maybe we could hang out later. The change of pace might do you some good." said Alex hoping to help his small avian neighbor a little.

"Sure, I might stop bye later. Thanks Alex." answered Kowalski

"Cool." Alex then turned his head and sniffed. "Oh, Alice is coming! I'll see you later." The loin then hurried back to his own habitat.

"Well thats fun isn't? Getting invited over to Alexs place." said Private

"Yeah." said Kowalski with yet another shrug.

"Are you sure that your feeling alright Kowalski?" asked Skipper looking a bit worried.

"Yeah, but I guess that I should be careful of eating Peanut Butter Winkys when they are passed their exasperation date." said Kowalski with a slight grin.

"We tried to tell you, but no The options guy knows everything." Private joked. The team laughed. Though the feeling that something was wrong still plagued Kowalski.

The rest of the day, that is until closing, was spent keeping the humans entertained. The penguins made sure it was cute and cuddly, though Kowalski wasn't feeling very cute or cuddly, while Alex danced, Marty did his water routine, Gloria swam like a one member synchronized swim team and Melmen found yet another brown spot. All the other animals did their own things as well.

"Just another beautiful day in The Big Apple!" thought most of Team Penguin. Kowalski didn't think so. He mostly kept to himself as he tried to figure out either what was wrong or how to get rid of the feeling that something was. He knew that it had something to do with not only his team, but some of the others as well. Alex and his three best friends sprang to mind.

Skipper got so worried about his Lieutenant that he managed to get Alices attention focused of him. What he did was wait until Kowalski was swimming past him on his back while he was on the island and when none of the kids were looking he jumped on him, causing him to go under water. Both penguins were unharmed and Skipper swam away, but Kowalski splashed around and made a lot of noise. Thinking that he was hurt or sick Alice immediately scooped him up and took him to the doctor. Skipper had not been trying to hurt him, he was just trying to get Alice to take him to the doctor. It was the only thing he could think of to make sure Kowalski was alright. Which he was, with the exception of all the water that he got in his nostrils of course.

On their way to the veterinary station, Alice and Kowalski had to pass Alex and his friends habitats. Alex was dramatically bowing to the crowd while the other three watched. The tall penguin strained to hear their conversation over the roaring crowd for some unknown reason. He didn't know why he was compelled to ease drop, but he was so he did. Alice was totally oblivious as one of her bosses came bye and started to question her on why she was carrying said bird in the first place.

" "I still say hes kind of a show off." Marty the zebra said of Alex, though he was smiling.

"You got to give it to him, the guys an animal!" the giraffe Melmen chimed in. He had a thermometer in his mouth and a plastic cone around is head.

"Maybe he needs a break. You know, we could all use a vacation." said Marty with a, though brief, thoughtful look on his face.

"Come on, where would we go on vacation?" asked their hippo friend Gloria.

"I don't know about you, but I want to go to Connecticut!" Marty answered with gusto." "

That was the last thing that Kowalski heard as Alice started moving again and they entered the veterinary station. They wanted to go on vacation? Was that it? Did this whole feeling have to do with Skippers old plan of going to Antarctica? Kowalski was then overcome with the feeling that they had somehow missed some big event that was supposed to happen, but for one reason or another it hadn't. What that big event was though he had no idea. He barely had this new feeling understood before Alice handed him off to the doctor.

After his impromptu check up, Kowalski was returned to a now deserted penguin island. Alice was a bit perplexed that she didn't see the other three, but figured that they were just swimming in an area of the habitat that she couldn't see and walked off to take care of the closing of the zoo. When she was a safe distance away he jumped into HQ through the fish dish covered hatch.

The first thing he heard was Private saying: "Ah, Skipper not that old map again." Kowalski looked over at Skipper to see that he was absorbed in a map of the old tunnel system that they had once planned on using to escape the zoo and head for Antarctica.

"I still don't get how that happened. Half of those tunnels collapsed in a way that we can't fix and the other half somehow got flooded with cement and both events happened on the same day, not long before Christmas." said Skipper He sighed then turned his back on the old map and leaned on the table. "Oh your back Kowalski. So how did it go."

"I'm happy to report that I have a clean bill of health, despite the expired Peanut Butter Winkys." said Kowalski grinning.

"Options guy knows everything." Private joked again. Kowalski grinned at him. He shrugged and grinned back.

"I know I sound like a broken record Kowalski, but did you ever figure out that whole thing with the tunnel system?" asked Skipper

"Sorry Skipper, I got nothing." answered Kowalski

"But?" asked Rico noticing that the confused look he had when he saw Alex earlier was slowly returning.

"But something feels off to me today. Anyone else got that feeling?" The team shook their heads at him.

"Well, you know what I say, listen to your gut." said Skipper

"I am, but I may be over thinking at the same time." said Kowalski "Wait, that can't right."

"Oh boy." said Rico

"Your the only one I know that could possibly pull that off." said Skipper trying not to laugh.

"Yeah and its giving me a headache." replied Kowalski rubbing his head. "I'm going to go and finish cleaning up the lab to try and get my mind off of things, if thats OK."

"Yeah sure." said the team. Rico then gave him a small broom.

"Show that dust whose boss." said Private with a wink.

"Your just full of good lines today." Kowalski said smiling before he left for the lab, Private shrugged.

Kowalski dusted the place good, disposing of the dust bye throwing it in the incinerator. Then he went about the task of gathering up all the files and gadget designs. Afterwards he started to go through them so that he could make sure that they were all organized correctly.

Outside the lab Skipper and Private were playing checkers. "King me again Skipper!" Private said triumphantly. "Looks like I have the upper flipper in this game!"

"Not for long my young friend. Years of living with Kowalski have taught me things that even I don't understand." Skipper said as he kinged Private.

Private blinked at him: "I think that sounded better in your head."

Skipper quickly thought about it. "Your not wrong." Skipper replied with an awkward shrug. Behind them Rico giggled.

A sudden high pitched scream made the three of them look at the closed hallway door. Though they recognized it as Kowalski, they couldn't help but wonder how his voice could go that high, sometimes when he got worked up while speaking even it would go up a few octaves. He burst out of his laboratory and stood in the doorway, obviously he found out what his 'something wrong' was. He was also breathing rapidly. Though he was not quite hyper ventilating, he was well on his way if he didn't calm down.

"Its gone . . . just gone!" Kowalski said his voice high pitched and his eyes bulging.

Skipper quickly went over and slapped him across the face: "Get a hold of yourself man!" Kowalski was brought back to his senses instantly. "Now what has got you so worked up?"

"The plans for the Chronotron are gone!" Kowalski almost shouted.

"Your time machine?" said Private

"Yeah, I remember that thing. There were about three multiples of you running around trying to prevent the sewer rats from taking over the city. Then the universe was nearly destroyed by that vortex and the multiples of you jumped back through the time portal. The annoying thing about it was that Rico destroyed it, thus saving everyone, but it was before I got the chance to slap a hippie." said Skipper Everyone blinked at Skipper because of his strange desire to slap a hippie, it didn't bother him until he saw Kowalski. He had a look of what could have been called 'dark confusion' coming over his face now. "Uh, Kowalski?"

"Are you sure thats how it happened Skipper?" he asked

"Of course, don't you remember?"

"Well yes, but that doesn't sound right to me for some reason." Kowalski answered The team blinked at him next. Kowalski then looked to be thinking hard.

Private hesitated but finely asked "Are you sure that you didn't toss the plans into the incinerator?"

"Yes, in fact I know for certain that I didn't burn those plans."

"How?" asked Rico

"Because I have a long memory. I remember every plan that I have ever thrown into that thing and that wasn't one of them. Not to sound mean, but give me a moment to think." Kowalski then began to pace thinking hard again. He thought of how he felt when he woke up this morning, of the confusion he felt when he saw Alex in his habitat and the feeling that they had somehow missed some big event that was supposed to happen, but didn't. "The time machine plans are missing." he mumbled He then brought everything together. "And the time machine plans are missing!" he said not only loudly but suddenly as well. His team watched as a look of realization came across the scientist face. "Thats it!" Kowalski suddenly proclaimed.

"Well, it sure sounds like you figured something out." said Private

Kowalski nodded: "Now this is going to sound really strange, but I want you all to hear me out alright?" The three other penguins nodded at him. "Now you boys remember what I said before right?"

"Yes." Private answered promptly as ever. "You said that you felt that there was something off about today." Kowalski couldn't help but grin at him. "But, now I have a question. Dose it have something to do with Alex?"

"Yes, but don't jump to conclusions! (That was mostly aimed at Skipper) Seeing the loin this morning really got my attention, but this doesn't just have to do with him. It has to do with his three friends, as well the four of us and possibly someone we have never even met!" answered Kowalski

"I may not know what your leading up to Kowalski, but I can tell you that it doesn't sound good." said Skipper

"It's not good Skipper. What I believe is going on here is that we are in an alternate time line." said Kowalski

"What?" asked Rico

"An alternate time line. Listen, I know that this sounds like something out of one of those Scifi movies we like, but I truly believe thats whats going on. My time machines plans are missing and I have been feeling that something is wrong since I woke up today. Actually, thats what woke me up. I'm also feeling that we somehow missed a very big event in our lives that was supposed to happen, but did not. An alternate time line happens when someone goes back in time and changes some pivotal thing or moment that changes everything else. Whats changed may even be a seemingly small thing, but once its changed everything changes." Kowalski went silent as he, for the time being, ran out of things to say. He looked in between his teammates as they stared at him. They seemed to be processing what he had just said.

"How is it that you are the only one who is picking up on this do you think?" asked Private

"It must be a product of my Chronotron. Like some kind of residual particles or energy transfer from when I used it and there were multiples of me running around. Also, it could be possible that in our true time line I built and used the device as well and thats what is causing these feelings." Kowalskis eyes then widened as a freakish thought struck him: "Oh, I do hope that I wasn't the one who caused this!"

"You? Nu-uh!" said Rico

"Yeah, your way to smart to let something like this happen." said Private Kowalski smiled at the two of them, reassured bye their confidence in him.

"Now that thats all sorted, what do you think the pivotal change was?" Private then asked.

Kowalski tilted his head at him slightly. "Could it be that we slightly underestimate him?" he thought

"The old tunnel system!" Skipper said suddenly.

"Huh?" said the other three.

"What happened to the tunnel system. It being rendered completely unusable, that has got to be it!" said Skipper

Kowalski thought about it for a moment: "That would explain your obsession with that occurrence." Kowalski nodded at Skipper sensing somehow that he was right.

"Who would be so devious as to do this to us?" Skipper then asked no one in particular. There wasn't a very long wait as the only answer that could be drawn to hit the entire group at the same time: "Blow hole!"

"Gr!" went Kowalski getting angry. The team looked at him. "Its bad enough that he always gets the good stuff, but now he is stealing my stuff and using it against us." Skipper, Private and Rico were expecting this kind of thing. He always got this way when it came to Dr. Blow hole. It was when his eyes widened and he became dead calm at sonic speed that they started to get nervous. "We have to stop him and fast."

"What, do you know what hes up to suddenly?" asked Skipper

"Probably." he answered his voice oddly sharp. Skipper exchanged a look with the other two. Kowalski shook himself and spoke in that strangely calm way, though its sharpness was gone: "What I do know is what I would do if I was him. As creepy as that sounds. After building the machine I would of course give it a test run."

"The tunnels?" said Private

"Precisely. Now there are two scenarios that he could be working on and one may take longer but its a lot more subtle, but counter intuitively, it is much worse and not to mention, more likely to work." said Kowalski

"OK." said Skipper visibly shaken bye what he just said.

"The first scenario is that he wants to make sure that we are all in one place so he can take us out in one shot. But one thats not very likely to work because we would just fight him off and two thats way to simple for him. You know that he likes more of a challenge." Kowalski explained Team Penguin nodded in agreement.

"So whats the other scenario?" asked Private heroically trying not to look scared of the answer.

"Well, scenario the second would be that he is trying to make it so we never met, because if we hadn't we would never have become the team we are and therefore we wouldn't be there to stop him from carrying out whatever deranged plan he wants. That second plan is more likely then the first one because its the plan with the most promise of working." said Kowalski "Albeit only just, now that we are on to him." he quickly added catching the look on Private face. He was secretly trying to comfort him seeing as he looked like he was about to scream like he himself did earlier. Just as he hoped the younger penguin calmed down.

"Now that we have this all figured out what do we do?" Private then asked.

"Isn't obvious Young Private? We find out where that mad doctor is, stop him from doing whatever plan he is doing, then fix the time line." Skipper said

"No, no Skipper. We don't find out _where_ he is, we find out _when_ he is!" proclaimed Kowalski grinning.

Skipper gave him a look: "Kowalski, you do know that this whole situation is bordering on cliché don't you?"

"Yes." Kowalski answered looking like he was trying not to laugh.

"So why did you have to go there?"

"How could I not, I'd like to know." he said Then he and the other two burst out laughing. Skipper put a wing to his head and sighed, though he couldn't deny that he was slightly amused by that last exchange.

"So how are we going to find out _when_ Blow hole is?" Skipper then asked.

"That I'm not sure of." replied Kowalski looking embarrassed.

"Really?" asked Rico surprised. He didn't see that coming.

"I have it, we build another Chronotron to counteract his!" said Private thinking quickly. "Maybe we can lock on to his signal or something like that."

"Oh, that sounds promising." said Skipper Rico nodded.

"But how am I to do that without the plans?" asked Kowalski

"You said it yourself, you have a long memory. You can do it!" said Private fully confident in his tech savvy friends abilities.

"Hmm." was Kowalskis response, until he saw that the other two had looks on their faces that were similar to Privates. "Right!" said Kowalski getting his game face on. "But we are going to need some help."

"Wait, tell it to me again." said Alex with a skeptical look on his face. Kowalski chuckled nervously under the loins gaze. He had just told him what him and the other penguins had figured out back at headquarters and asked him for his help in procuring supplies from around the zoo, which is what the others were currently doing. "I'm uh just telling you whats going on."

"Have you been eating expired Peanut Butter Winkys and watching the Scifi Channel again because I heard about your trip to the vet earlier." said Alex Kowalski cleared his throat in an embarrassed sort of way, but didn't answer.

"It sure looks like you got him pegged!" said Marty with a laugh.

Kowalski turned his back on them trying to think of what to say next. Thats when he saw Private talking to their stray cat buddy Max. In a strange coincidence he had stopped bye to see how everything was going in the zoo. Private was asking him if he could help them by getting a message to their other outside of the zoo friend Kitka, a lady falcon, because Skipper asked him to. Max nodded at Private then left him. Private then turned and saw Kowalski looking at him. He shrugged and waved. Kowalski got a cunning grin on his face and turned back to Alex and Marty. "Alright fellas last chance. Give us a hand or I'll bring out the big guns." Kowalski said

"The big guns? Yeah right!" said Marty laughing again.

"Careful what you say, those penguins can be psychotic." Alex told him quietly.

"Fine, but don't say that I didn't warn you." said Kowalski as he exited the habitat not at all bothered by the loins comment as it was part of their reputation. Though anyone that knew them well knew that they wouldn't hurt anyone without just cause. Alex was barely finished giving Marty a confused look before the tall penguin returned, but this time he wasn't alone.

"Come on guys. You just have to help us out or who knows what might happen." said Private as he slowly walked towards the two best friends putting on his best sad puppy dog type face.

"Oh, the force is strong with this one." Gloria whispered to Melmen as they arrived on the scene. They had been having their own conversation some distance away and came over to see why Alex and Marty were twitching.

"OK, OK! We'll help just call off the cutest of all penguins already!" they said at the same time. Private turned around and grinned at Kowalski.

He grinned back and said "Gloria is right, the force is strong with you." The two penguins exchanged a high five when the others weren't looking.

"Alright, so what do you need?" asked Alex Kowalski pulled a list of what they were to get from his feathers. The list was little drawings of the items with a number indicating how many he needed. The list wasn't very long.

"Thanks guys." said Kowalski as he and Private left the habitat. They went back to HQ to see that Skipper and Rico had gotten what they were supposed to get. They put their supplies next to the supplies that Kowalski and Private got earlier. "Wow, we are doing pretty good. All we need is the supplies from the other two and the help from Kitka and we should be all set."

"What are you going to do in the mean time?" asked Skipper

"I have some calculations to do." he replied He was about halfway done with them when there was a knock on the hatch. "Not to sound snotty, but I'm in my math zone could you guys take care of that?"

"I'm on it!" said Skipper in a perky tone guessing correctly who the caller was. "Ah Miss Kitka, you got our message."

"Off course, that Max sure is a quick one. It was also lucky that I was nearby." Kitka said "So, the feline said that you needed help. What do you need?"

"Uh, do you remember the time when Kowalski was working on that machine and we needed that bright pink glowing chemical to run said machine?" asked Skipper unsure on how to explain the situation to her. Which he would on the way, if she agreed to help them.

"Not the one that nearly destroyed the universe with a vortex!" said Kitka surprised.

"Yes, I'm afraid so. See we are rebuilding it to stop one of our enemies and we are fresh out of said chemical. Since you helped us get it before, in this time line anyway, I figured that you could help us get some again." Kitka gave Skipper a look, not knowing what to make of what he just said. "I know that sounded strange, but I wouldn't have sent for you if it wasn't important."

"I know that Skipper and I will of course help you, but you have to promise me one thing first." Kitka replied

"Alright, whats that?" asked Skipper

"You have to make sure that you beat this guy and beat him butt good." said Kitka with gusto.

"Miss Kitka, you have got yourself a deal." Skipper said with a proud and confident smile. Skipper turned and yelled down the open hatch: "Alright boys I'm going to go with Miss Kitka and get that Macguffium two-thirty-nine for the Chronotron. Kowalski, hows that math coming?"

"Almost done Skipper!" came Kowalskis voice.

"Good, once its done get building. Private and Rico do what Kowalski tells you to the letter. We'll be back soon."

"Right!" said Rico

"Rodger that Skipper!" answered Private

True to his word Skipper and Kitka were back very soon, with just what they needed. Kitka, somehow sensing the urgency of the situation, flew her fastest. Not only getting the chemical faster then she did last time, in this time line, but breaking a personal record of flying from the zoo to midtown and back again. The two of them jumped down the hatch to see the other three hard at work on the time machine.

"Hows it going boys?" asked Skipper

"We are about half way done and making excellent time!" said Kowalski his confident tech savvy swagger back.

"Good to know." said Kitka happily right before she gasped.

"That ain't right!" yelled Skipper horrified by what he was seeing. Kowalski and Rico whipped around to see what Skipper meant and gasped just like Kitka had. Private, who was in the middle of the room carrying something over to Kowalski, stopped and looked down at himself. He looked fuzzy, like when the TV has bad reception. Only there was one difference, it was without the TV. He screamed and dropped what he was carrying.

"Whats going on?" he asked rightfully panicked.

"We found out _when_ Blow hole is! London, the day that Private was going to be sent over!" said Kowalski just as panicked if not more then he was. The three penguins surrounded their young friend. Kowalski quickly grabbed his options clipboard from the floor and Rico tossed him a pencil. He marked down the date, time and location as fast as he could.

"Quick Kowalski, get this stuff down too!" yelled Private suddenly. "First, I was the youngest penguin at the London Zoo, my favorite snack is Peanut Butter Winkys, I like rainbows, unicorns and adorable plush toys." The last thing that he was able to do was give them fast directions to the habitat that he lived in when he still resided at the London Zoo. He was sure that they were going to need all the help they could get against their arch enemy, he just hoped that he would still be able to help them. He didn't know what else he could do. Kowalski also thought to quickly do a sketch of The Private. He didn't really know why, but he thought that it would be a good idea. The team watched unable to do anything as he faded away completely, like he was never there. Technically though he never was.

"We have to get this thing done pronto!" Skipper barked quickly before his memories started to change, his voice hitching slightly. So thats exactly what they did and with Kitka helping they were almost done in no time at all.

"Great, now all that we need is the last few components from-" began Kowalski There was a sudden knock from up above. "Perfect timing!" Team Penguin and Kitka went topside to get what they needed from Alex and Marty.

"Well heres the stuff that Kitka and Skipper tricked us into getting before they left. Sorry it took so long, Alice almost caught us." Alex said as he handed the items to Rico and Skipper.

"Wait, Skipper and Kitka tricked you?" asked Kowalski

"Yeah, it was a plan that Kitka came up with. Didn't they fill you in?" said Marty

"That definitely dose not sound right, but yes they did." answered Kowalski

"Yeah, your right. Also now that I look at you guys I feel that something is missing. I don't know what, but something in your team is definitely missing." said Alex Him and Marty shared a look, both shrugged.

The three penguins looked at each other and likewise shrugged. Then Skipper said "We got to go finish that thing up. Thanks for the help." The team and Kitka jumped back into HQ and under Kowalskis direction, added the last components to the machine as fast as possible. "There is nothing the three of us can't do and with Miss Kitka helping we do it even faster!" said Skipper grinning.

"Three of us?" asked Rico looking at the table and seeing Kowalskis famous options clipboard sitting on it.

"Plus Kitka." said Kowalski with a shrug.

Rico went over to the table and picked up the aforementioned clipboard. "We sure?" asked Rico showing it to them. They saw a quick sketch of a young male penguin and some intelligence on him. Skipper and Kowalski looked at each other.

"We are missing our forth!" said Kowalski

"We have got to move." said Skipper

Kowalski nodded, then went over to Rico and got his clipboard, then he moved on to the Chronotron. He put the device into programing mode and punched in the date, time and location that was on his clipboard. Thats when he realized that it was in his own writing. "How dose that work?" he thought He then got the funny feeling that the time stream was trying to correct itself. Thats why the page on the clipboard still had writing on it. It also a counted for all the strange coincidences that happened today: like Max showing up when he did and Kitka being nearby. It was rare for her to be so close to the zoo at that time of day. "Time travel is a funny creature." Kowalski thought Somehow this thought had a reassuring effect on him. He then turned around and said "All I need now is the-" His teammates tossed him the Macguffium two-thirty-nine, which he caught. "Well, then we should be good to go!" Without another word he installed the bright pink chemical in the machine. The time portal appeared just like it was supposed to. Kowalski wouldn't admit it, but he was very surprised seeing how it was built entirely from memory. The time portal was also a lot stronger then last time as the vile of Macguffium two-thirty-nine was a lot bigger then last time. As such it would last a lot longer. Before he faced the others he hit an additional switch that would keep the portal open for their return trip.

"Hey Kowalski, I know that this is a bit off topic but-" began Skipper

Kowalski smiled in an amused sort of way: "Yes Skipper, if we have time you can slap yourself a hippie."

"Alright!" Skipper said pumping his wings in the air. Everyone laughed.

"OK boys, come back safe. I'll hold down the fort for you." said Kitka

"Thanks." said Skipper He gave her a quick salute, then took a running start and jumped into the time portal. Rico went next.

Kowalski was just about to when Kitka called him back briefly: "Hey Kowalski, lets try to do this without the world destroying vortex this time."

Kowalski laughed: "I make no promises, but I'll do my best." Kitka had just enough time to grin at him before he jumped into the time portal.

"Flying through a pink wormhole is kind of fun." Skipper was saying as Kowalski effortlessly caught up.

"I do wonder why you seem fascinated bye the color pink." Kowalski commented. Rico giggled as he did a flip. Skipper cleared his throat but didn't say anything. "Oh I'm going to pay for that one later." said Kowalski Skipper nodded at him grinning. It was shortly after this that they were shot out of the other end of the wormhole. They landed on their fronts a few feet away.

"Again with the cliché!" announced Skipper after he got up and looked back at the time portal.

"Huh?" asked Rico

"What do you mean Skipper?" asked Kowalski

"A mirror, really?" said Skipper pointing at the time portal. The other two looked to see that it took up the largest piece of a broken mirror that was leaning on the wall. Skipper sighed. Then they turned and started walking. They appeared to be in a warehouse of some kind.

"I don't know, maybe we watch the Scifi Channel to much." said Kowalski

"But I do know someone who eats expired Peanut Butter Winkys to much." said Skipper laughing.

"Oh burn!" said Rico grinning.

Kowalski laughed then said "I wonder if we bust each others tail feathers like this in our true time line."

"I sure hope so, because its fun." replied Skipper right before shifting into commando mode. "Keep sharp boys. This might get hairy. So where to Kowalski?" The options guy then pulled his clipboard from his feathers and avoiding the humans, they followed the directions on it. They ended up at the London Zoos penguin exhibit. They carefully wondered through looking for the youngest occupant. They quickly found him sitting at the far end of the enclosure, keeping to himself leaning on a fake rock drawing something on a piece of paper.

"That is so cute!" he said to himself as he turned around holding the drawing of a unicorn jumping over a rainbow in front of his own face. When he moved the picture down he saw three older penguins standing in front of him. He jumped because he didn't know them or knew that they were standing there. "Uh, hello." he said giving them a good natured smile. They smiled back at him, then the tallest of the group looked down at something on his clipboard, then he looked back up at the young penguin.

"Hes a perfect match." he said to his two friends pointing at the clipboard.

"And he is obviously the youngest penguin here." said the shortest penguin who had a flat head.

"Now what?" asked the scared one.

The young penguin tilted his head at them: "You must be new around here. Are you transfers?"

"Uh no, not exactly." said the tall one.

"What do they call you?" asked the flat headed one.

"Uh, well I don't really have a name." he answered looking a bit awkward. "I was planing on making up a name when I got to America, but someone put the kibosh on that." He looked sad for a moment, but the good natured smile quickly returned: "So what are your names?"

The flat headed one: "I'm The Skipper."

The tall one: "Lieutenant Kowalski."

The scared one: "Staff Sargent Rico."

The young penguin nodded: "Military huh? I never would have guessed. Uh, have we met somewhere before? You seem familiar to me for some reason."

"Thats an encouraging sign, you seem familiar to us too." said Kowalski

"We are looking for a couple of someones, one of them is a young penguin. Would you mind if Kowalski asked you a few questions?" asked Skipper

"Sure." said the young penguin with a shrug.

"Alright, whats your favorite snack?" asked Kowalski

"Peanut Butter Winkys." answered the young penguin.

"Going good so far. Do you like adorable plush toys?" was the next thing Kowalski said

"Yes." answered the young penguin getting a bit nervous.

"Another positive answer. How about rainbows and unicorns?" Kowalski was surprised by the young penguins speed as he suddenly had his beak clamped shut.

Somewhat surprised by his own actions he let Kowalski go and signaled the other two to come closer: "I really like those things too, but I don't want that getting out. I get teased enough because of my age, size and other things too. Which is why I was so looking forward to my transfer to America. I was hoping that anyone I met over there would be nicer to me or at the very least wouldn't start teasing me, in a mean spirited way, about every little thing. I was planning on having some fun bye taking up miniature golf-" Kowalski suddenly made a raspberry type noise and shook his head with out knowing why. Everyone gave him a look.

"Sorry about that. I don't know where it came from." he said "But the good news is that your the penguin that we are looking for and we are not going to tease you and if we ever do we are just playing, or as we say 'busting your tail feathers'." He then turned the clipboard around and showed it to the young penguin. He gave it a surprised look, but didn't say anything.

"You mentioned that someone put the kibosh on you transfer. What did you mean?" asked Skipper

"Well, for the last few weeks I and the zoo staff have been getting ready for my transfer. As you can see we are a bit over crowed here." the young penguin answered.

"OK, we are with you so far. Also I'm guessing that you over heard the staff talking about this right?" said Skipper

"Yes, then all of a sudden the staff member in charge of my transfer, which was underway at the time, received two messages from his boss on the laptop he had. The first one said that they are going to just expand the habitat instead of transferring anyone out because they suddenly got the money to do so. Though the few staff members that know about it are very confused about where it all came from. They are also confused because apparently they were told that the next time the zoo received a good amount of money it would be used towards the zoos medical center. One staff member read these messages off his laptop to another since she couldn't find her own for some reason. I was in a small cage nearby about to be put into a crate."

"And what was the second message?" asked Kowalski

"That one was about how this zoo is going to temporarily play host to a strange bottle nosed dolphin. As they were bringing me back to this habitat I saw him being brought in."

"'A strange bottle nosed dolphin'?" asked Skipper getting a suspicious look in his eyes.

The young penguin nodded: "Yes, I think he must be from some kind of side show or something because he has this weird blue metal hardware on one side of his face. It looks like something from a Scifi movie or something. He also had a mad scientist type laugh as well. It gave me the willies, so I just don't want to go near him."

"Trust me that dolphin is no scientist, mad or otherwise." said Kowalski getting a very disgruntled look on his face.

"Is your friend alright?" the young penguin asked.

"He always gets like this when it comes to that dolphin. As for me I tend to get more then a bit paranoid." said Skipper with an awkward grin. "Hes the other 'someone' that we are looking for. Hes also the one who stopped your transfer from going through and he is going to do a lot worse if we don't stop him."

"So hes obviously an enemy then." The young penguin looked a bit nervous again.

"Arch enemy." grunted Rico

"Oh dear." the young penguin said in an undertone.

"So Private, whens closing time? Because thats when the four of us are going to make our move." Skipper said in a very authoritative tone.

"The four of us? Wait you called me Private." the young penguin gave him a confused look.

"Did I? Huh, well it just seems right." said Skipper with a shrug.

"You don't mind do you?" asked Kowalski

He took a moment to think about it then said "No, in fact I think that The Skipper is spot on, it dose seem right. So no, I don't mind at all."

"So closing time?"

"Thats in a few minutes." answered The new young private. "So, the four of us?"

"You know the lay of the land around here. We don't know where that deranged dolphin is, but you do. Besides the faster we get rid of him the faster you get your transfer." answered Skipper

"Oh, well I didn't think of it that way. I'll do my best Skipper, thats all I can promise." said Private with a shrug. His three new friends smiled at him.

"Whats that?" asked Rico pointing at the abandoned drawing they saw Private working on earlier. Private picked it up and showed it to them.

"Awe!" the three penguins said at the same time.

"I bet that you could make adorableness into a secret weapon if you tried hard enough." Kowalski commented Private smiled.

Just then a gruff looking penguin that was about Rico hight came over. "Oi, who drew that ridiculous thing?" he asked

"Not again." Private said quietly. He then tried to hide his work of art.

"Give it!" barked the gruff penguin reaching for it, but Kowalski was faster.

"Its mine." he said laying it on his clipboard. "I was showing it to him and I dropped it bye accident. He was picking it up for me so it wouldn't get damaged. Thanks for that bye the way." He then attached the drawing to the clipboard with a sharp snap.

"And who are you lot?" he then asked the three military penguins.

"We are friends of his, we are here on a visit." Skipper replied smoothly.

"Friends of his? Since when dose this little twerp have friends." the gruff and now jerky penguin then pushed Private. He stumbled a little, but didn't quite fall over. Rico got angry. He growled and pinned him against the fake rock that Private had used to make his drawing.

"I wouldn't suggest that you try that again." said Skipper glaring. "Now get out of here soldier. Don't make me take Rico here off his leash."

The restrained penguin took one look at the expression on angry Ricos face and said "Sir yes sir!" Rico let him go and took a step back. The other penguin used a belly slide to get away as fast as he could. Private didn't want to say anything, but the look on his face spooked him a bit too. The scared penguin calmed very quickly though and smiled reassuringly at him.

"Really thanks for that and by the way thats just on the lightest days." Private said The others now saw why he had been looking forward to his transfer. They changed the subject and used the remainder of their waiting time to tell The young private about America. When closing time came the penguins made their move. The young private took point as he knew where to go. It was a warehouse like building, very much like the one the boys arrived in. Yet that one was for storage only. This one was equipped to house animals temporarily. Though there were some crates in there too, but they were mostly filled with food for the animals housed there. It was technically called 'The Quarantine Area' but the zoos residents knew it as 'The Animal Transfer Area'. Near the back there was a large tank. In it was Team Penguins arch enemy: Dr. Blow hole. It seemed that he had more then a few humans tending to him for some reason. One of them wheeled in a somewhat large oddly shaped crate that stopped not to far away from the dolphins tank. This was not lost on Private as he peeked around the corner of another crate to check if they were in the right place.

"Hmm, thats strange." he said as he turned around to face the others.

"Strange?" asked Kowalski

"Well, at this time of day there isn't supposed to be any humans in here and theres about six of them over there." answered Private "Also, I know all the faces of the zoos staff. Not only don't I know those faces, but they are the same people that brought the dolphin in. I thought that they were just the delivery crew so I didn't mention it before."

"Are you sure? Take another, closer look." said Skipper Rico then reared back a bit then hacked up a pair of the penguins high tech binoculars. Private was shocked. "Uh, you'll get used to that." said Skipper as he gave the binoculars to Private.

He used the binoculars to peek around the corner again. "Sweet fish cakes!" he quietly exclaimed as he saw that the humans were not humans at all. The human outside seemed to be made out of some kind of floppy plastic or rubber. It fell away as the super lobsters on the inside, of what turned out to be human puppets, unzipped it from the inside. They were now balancing on metal semi-human shaped frames that had wires and pulleys all over them. There were five super lobsters to each human sized puppet.

"What is it?" asked Kowalski Private gave him the binoculars. He then looked around the crate. "Oh, thats a bit of a problem. In addition to Blow hole there are about thirty of those super lobsters he surrounds himself with."

"Any sign of his Chronotron copy?" asked Skipper The question was barely out of Skipper when the large and oddly shaped crate was pried open. It was a lot larger then the one Kowalski made, but was unmistakably a Chronotron.

"Target spotted." replied Kowalski Rico and Skipper then shared the binoculars and had themselves a look.

The two penguins gasped when the time machine was activated and Blow hole said "Now that the beta testing is over its time to take my plan to the next stage!" Then he laughed manically.

Private shook slightly when he heard it, Kowalski put a wing on his shoulder to calm him down. He then took another peek around the corner. He saw one of the super lobsters place a laptop on the edge of the tank. He recognized it as the one that the female staff member was missing because it had a large pink pony sticker on it. "He must be using the laptop to work that machine." Private said to the others.

"Once his disguised troops got clearance in this place it would have been easy for them to swipe it. It must be easier for him since he is in that tank right now, he can't get to the manual controls very well." said Kowalski

"Boys, we need to secure that laptop." said Skipper quite suddenly. "We get that and Blow hole will go down and Young Private will get his transfer. Rico, weapons check!" Rico then moved around in a really weird way, then once satisfied he nodded at Skipper, who nodded back: "Move out!" The four then went into a belly slide behind Skipper and went for the enemy.

"Hand over that laptop Dolphin Boy!" shouted Private when they were in front of the tank, suddenly feeling braver. The other three looked at him in surprise and grinned. "The owner of that laptop happens to be my favorite staff member." Private shrugged.

Blow hole whipped around: "What? How are you here?"

"The time stream is trying to correct itself and we are trying to help it along. Also you stole one of my creations. Did you honestly think that I wouldn't figure that out?" said Kowalski glaring at the dolphin. "We know exactly what your up to."

"Yes, I'm trying to correct the mistakes of the past. Like your pathetic little team being formed for example or this!" he said indicating the blue hardware on the side of his face.

Rico then spoke so fast that it came out all garbled, Kowalski translated when Blow hole got a confused look on his face: "He said that we know that your plot isn't as harmless as you would like us to believe it is."

Blow hole got an evil grin and said "He has a similar injury on his face. I'm surprised that hes not on my side." Rico got very angry at that and without any orders from Skipper he suddenly hacked up his rolling pin and jumped at Blow hole. Who used his old training from when he was a performing dolphin and hit Rico very hard with his tail. Rico flew through the air and into the large Chronotrons time portal. The mid-air hit caused him to drop his rolling pin. No one noticed that it hit the portal return switch.

"Rico!" shouted Skipper

"No!" shouted Kowalski while Private gasped. When the image of Rico defending him suddenly flashed in his mind the young penguin became very angry.

"Engage!" Skipper shouted as they saw that the super lobsters were starting to close in on them. Kowalski and Skipper met the super lobsters as they also engaged.

Private surprised them all bye using his speed to jump at Blow hole, landing on his face. He then held his mouth shut. "Its time for you to start running silent!" he shouted "There will be no kind of sneaky actions from you!" Blow hole then began to whip his head around and swim around the tank trying to shake Private off. Inadvertently he helped the other two as the water in the tank started to flood out on one side thanks to all of the commotion. Some of the enemy combatants got swept some distance away bye the water. Kowalski feared that it wasn't going to be enough though, but he didn't get to voice that as he had to stop one from sneaking up and catching Skipper in its claws.

When Blow hole surfaced again, still whipping his head around, Private was distracted bye the fact that the laptop was in danger of being damaged bye the sloshing water. The result was he got thrown off of Blow holes face. "Save that laptop." Blow hole shrieked One of the formally swept away lobsters grabbed it just in time.

Private covered his eyes and screamed as he flew though the air, expecting that at any moment he would hit the concrete floor. He almost jumped in surprise when he felt himself get caught in midair. Then he was gently placed on the floor. He opened his eyes and looked up at who saved him: "Rico!" The scared penguin stood with Private sitting on the floor in front of him flanked bye two other penguins. One held one of Ricos kendo sticks, the other held Ricos small bat.

When Blow hole saw them he blinked a few times and said "Oops, it seems that I programed the wrong time and location into that thing!"

"Sorry that we are tardy to the party Skipper." said one of them.

"Next time you should send out the invites a bit earlier." said the other one.

"It can't be!" said Kowalski looking over when Private screamed and doing a double take.

Skipper kicked the lobster that he was fighting and whipped around: "Manfredi, Johnson how did you-?" Rico waved at him as he retrieved his rolling pin from the floor. Skipper grinned.

"It seems that the stories of our demise have been exaggerated a bit, wouldn't you say Johnson?" Manfredi asked grinning at Skipper. Rico giggled as Johnson nodded.

Skipper laughed nervously as he rubbed the back of his head. "Ho-how did you find out about that?" the embarrassed Skipper asked.

"Rico told us." answered Manfredi with a shrug.

"Yes, just as long as you steer clear of the amazon." said Kowalski in what was meant to be an undertone.

"What was that?" asked Johnson

"Never mind." he answered

"Uh, boys we are kind of in the middle of a battle here." said Skipper who was back in the thick of it. The four penguins then gave Skipper some well needed back up. With the entire team now there they were making quick work of the so called 'super lobsters', until Skipper spotted the lobster with the laptop. He was trying to make his way over to Dr. Blow hole. "Private on me! Lets move!" The two of them tackled the lobster, but they were to late as a fraction of a second before he threw the laptop to the dolphin.

He caught it with one flipper and started hitting buttons with the other saying: "As Skipper would say I need to change tactics!"

"Rico, grappling gun, cover us!" said Johnson

"Yeah, you know what to do!" said Manfredi as they both darted away.

"Right!" grunted Rico He quickly hacked up the object in question.

Dr. Blow hole dodged a jump kick from Kowalski bye throwing the laptop into the air and swimming to one side, unaware that he was now next to his time machine. He jumped into the air with the intention of catching it. Then seemingly out of nowhere two penguins, namely Manfredi and Johnson, collided with him. The three of them went flying towards the large Chronotron.

"No!" shouted Blow hole

"Cambodia here we come!" yelled Johnson

"See you there boys!" shouted Manfredi

The three of them then disappeared in the Chronotrons time portal. Rico saved the laptop by firing the grappling gun and using the cable like a whip. He ended up doing the patented Indiana Jones grabbing things with the whip trick. Skipper and Private caught it easily before it hit the ground. Though it was hard for him, Kowalski quickly shut down the time machine.

He sighed then asked "What do you think Johnson meant by 'Cambodia here we come'?"

"Or Manfredi when he said 'See you there boys!'?" said Skipper "Maybe we will know when we get back to our true time line, its most likely an old classified mission." Everyone shrugged, especially Private because he didn't know what Skipper meant bye 'true time line'. "Alright, first things first. How do we get rid of this thing?" Skipper asked giving the large Chronotron a scathing look.

"A.M.F.O. or C4?" asked Rico grinning.

Much to Ricos disappointment, they didn't blow up Blow holes Chronotron. Instead they spent most of the night dismantling it. Then they spread the components around the zoo, putting them into recycling bins to be hauled away. Kowalski was pretty annoyed to find that this time machine burned through Macguffium two-thirty-nine like nobodies business. As such there was none to bring back with him.

"Way to go on being Eco-friendly Kowalski." commented Private

"Its a gift." he replied grinning. After they were done with that the tech savvy penguin then used the rescued laptop to 'work his magic'. When the zoos staff came in the next day and checked the zoos data base they were convinced that the orders to expand the penguin exhibit from the zoos head honcho were a hoax from some unnamed and not found hacker from Hong Kong. They were also convinced that the new dolphin they were housing got taken away during the night by an emergency response team for a sudden medical treatment that he was in dire need of and the money was to be used to improve the zoo veterinary facility, just like they were originally told. Sadly though the girls laptop had to be destroyed to protect Team Penguins covert operations, so Rico got his kaboom. They let Private save the pink pony sticker though, he put it on the back of his drawing.

"So the transfers are back on then?" asked the laptops former owner outside the penguin enclosure the next morning. She was talking to a male coworker. Who nodded as he checked his laptop. At hearing that Skipper and the other two pushed Private out into the open so he would be easily seen.

"Wait, I forgot my-" he started to whisper.

"Shh!" ordered Skipper as the girl approached Private.

She picked him up and said "I'm kind of sad. This little penguin was always my favorite." She gently put him into a small cage for the walk to his point of departure. "Well, maybe you will make some friends over in America." Private smiled at her, then looked to see his three new friends carefully peeking out of their hiding place. They nodded at him, then gave him a salute. Which he returned. Once he was out of sight Kowalski said "OK, now we have to hurry and get back to our time before we cause any damage."

"Right, lets move." said Skipper They said no more as they carefully, but quickly made it back to their time portal and jumped in. "Miss Kitka, we are back. Part of the time line should be repaired now. We should be back on the time line that Kowalski woke up to today or was it yesterday?" Skipper tilted his head.

"I'm not sure, but whatever it is I'm tired." said Kowalski "But wait was this time line, at least, really fixed? There still seem to be only three of us!" Kowalski looked around the room in a worried sort of way. As their memories started to change so that they remembered what happened with Private before they went into the Chronotron. They would be aware of everything that happened in a matter of seconds. Just like Kitka was.

How that worked, none of them really knew or cared because: "I don't know if its fixed. Perhaps you should ask him." Kitka suddenly interrupted grinning. When the three penguins looked at her she stepped aside to reveal that Private was standing there.

"Hey boys, greetings from London. Long time no see!" he said winking. He just couldn't help himself. The three of them laughed, then ran over to him. Soon after that there was a flurry of high fives. "Well, thats part one of the mission accomplished." Once they had calmed down a bit Skipper, Rico and Kowalski remembered how tired they were.

"We are definitely going to need some Red Bull before jumping back in there." said Skipper indicating Kowalskis Chronotron without looking.

"Some food would be warranted as well I think." said Kowalski

"FISH!" Rico chimed in.

It was then that they all heard the unmistakable sound of The Chronotron powering down. Three of the penguins whipped around, completely freaked out that the only way to finish their mission was now kaput or done-ski as Kowalski might put it.

"Merry Madagascar!" shouted Skipper The other two stared at him. He shrugged: "Yeah, I don't know where that one came from. Thats not the point though. Kowalski options!"

Kowalski was about to say that there wasn't any. As he took out his clipboard they all heard: "Ahem." They turned around to see that Private was grinning at them. They blinked at him. A moment later he pulled a vile of Macguffium two-thirty-nine from his feathers. They just stared at him, unable to believe what they were seeing. Kowalski was so amazed that he dropped his options clipboard.

Kitka laughed: "I don't know what your all staring at. After Private returned we had to do something while we were waiting for you. You would have liked that Kowalski. It looked just like something out of Star Trek."

"Thats right. I've been here for hours waiting for you. So, we went to get a back up vile. Always prepared baby." said Private grinning. After that everyone burst out laughing. Afterwards they all had the sushi that Private also made while they were waiting, and oddly enough some Red Bull before they re-activated the Chronotron to save their old tunnel system and complete their mission. They went back to the day that the tunnels got flooded with cement and irreparably collapsed that was not long before Christmas that year. This time the time portal took up the reflective surface that covered the bottom part of the door of the zoos souvenir shop. They used the grappling gun to get to the roof, then the four of them shared two sets of binoculars.

"Look, there we are." said Private pointing at their own habitat. "Wow, are we really that pudgy?"

"Well, in my case at least its mostly muscle, (His team gave him a look) but we have slimed down since then." said Skipper as they watched their past selves:

"Just smile and wave boys, smile and wave." said Skipper He then turned around. "Kowalski status report."

Kowalski popped up from the fish dish covered hatch. "We are right on schedule and well on our way to the main sewer line." he said

"And the bad news?" asked Skipper

"We are starting run low on supplies." Kowalski reported

"Right." Skipper said He then turned to Rico. "Rico, litter patrol. We need shovels and other supplies." Rico nodded and flipped into the water.

"And me Skipper? What do you want me to do?" asked Private as Skipper turned to him.

"I want you to be as cute and cuddly as you can be Young Private, keep the humans busy." he said gently mushing his face, Private laughed. "Soon, we are going to blow this dump." Skipper then dove into the water closely followed by Kowalski.

"I don't sound like that do I?" The Private on the roof asked his teammates. 'Try' as they might to hold it in they started giggling. Private gave then a look: "I mean my voice can't be that high pitched."

"Only when your sugar high." said Kowalski

"Or when your really freaked out about something." said Skipper

"Or-" began Rico

Private clamped his beak shut: "Thats quite enough of that. Don't we have a mission to complete?" He gave them another look when they started to giggle again, but he knew that they were just busting his tail feathers. "I remember that. We originally wanted to leave before Christmas that year, but then we had the issues with the tunnels and we were stuck here. Or so our current time line says." Private laughed then said "The funny thing about that year was Skipper thought that Dr. Blow hole was messing with the weather because it would snow then melt then snow again. We had a white Christmas, but the snow was gone by Martys birthday."

Skipper cleared his throat and hastily changed the subject: "Alright, we are going out on a supply gathering mission bye the looks of it. Kowalski is that enough time to do what needs to be done?"

"It should be." he answered

"But?" asked Skipper knowing that he just cut himself off.

"But, to get this mission to go our way we are going to have to split up. Two of us are going to have to take care of one half of the tunnel system while the other two take care of the other half. That way one enemy group can't warn the other." answered Kowalski

"Fine, Kowalski your with me. We'll take the tunnels that got filled with cement. You two will take the tunnels that irreparably caved in." said Skipper "We will meet back at our times HQ when we are done. That way it will make it less likely for a universe destroying vortex to form."

"So remember if you see yourself walking around you get away fast, before he sees you." reminded Kowalski

"Right!" said Private and Rico The feathered foursome then split up, looking for anything suspicious. Two going in one direction and two going in the other. Without thinking about it Skipper took the grappling gun with him.

Rico and Private used the closest entryway they had to get into their tunnel system. They walked for a short time looking for either the enemy or anything that might help them complete their mission. The second of which came in a surprising form. As Private passed by a side tunnel he did a double take, Skipper and Kowalski were standing about half way down talking.

"Rico." Private whispered gesturing him over. When Rico got to him he pointed out his find. They both shrugged and walked down the tunnel. "Uh, hi boys." Private said when they were almost over to the other two penguins. When they turned to see the two of them approaching Private saw that they had the map of the tunnels. The two time travelers instantly realized that those two were the ones who belonged there not the ones they came with.

"Hey, fellas." said Skipper looking confused. "I thought I put you on litter patrol Rico and you on cute and cuddly duty Private." Private and Rico didn't know what to say.

"Well, its close enough to closing time anyway and you know how quick Rico is. Thats why you almost always put him on litter patrol in the first place." said Kowalski unknowingly saving them from an awkward situation. "Anyway, you can help us get this finished faster. We are checking the tunnels to make sure that they are all safe. Clearly, its so far so good." While he had been speaking he was looking at the map, but at the end of his statement he looked up and grinned at them. Private and Rico saw a slightly confused look suddenly come to Kowalskis face.

"What?" the two of them asked.

"Where did that come from?" he asked tilting his head.

Skipper looked at him to see what he was looking at, then looked at Rico. "Well, don't you look distinguished." he said pointing out his scar, though he wasn't bothered by it and neither was Kowalski. They both assumed that it had always been there, but that Rico was self conscious about it and kept it covered somehow with his feathers. That joint thought was obvious as Skipper said "You don't have to be self conscious about that you know, at least not around us."

"I think that it will help your fearless reputation." Kowalski added grinning. Rico shrugged.

Private grinned until he saw some movement down the tunnel: "Skipper, I think that I just saw an intruder!"

"Boys, lets move."

Meanwhile the time traveling team of Skipper and Kowalski were sitting in a tree in re-con mode: "So do you see anything Kowalski?" asked Skipper

"Depends, dose Ten disguised super lobsters hiding behind a mix of fake and real park foliage with a large cement truck looking for secret tunnels count as something?" Kowalski asked giving him the binoculars so he could have a look.

"Yeah, I would say so." Skipper replied as he checked on it. "We better hurry."

They got down from the tree and were slowly moving in when they passed a large bush that was about half way in between where they started from and where they were headed. They suddenly heard Privates voice: "Skipper, Kowalski, what are you doing here? We thought that you were doing a tunnel safety check." They both jumped as they weren't expecting it. Then they went into the big bush. They knew bye what they had just heard that these two were the ones who belonged to this time.

"Rico, Private, what are you doing in the park?" asked Skipper trying to sound like he didn't already know about the super lobsters.

"Rico was out on litter patrol. Even though he got a good amount of supplies he wanted to get some more. Problem being is that its almost closing time so there is not much litter in easy to grab places. Not wanting to seen bye the clean up guys he came to the park. Thats when he saw that over there." Private then pointed out what Skipper and Kowalski already knew to be there. Not wanting to look out of place the two of them looked. "Thinking that they may be some of Skippers nemesis goons he called me out here from headquarters for a second opinion, using the walkie talkies. (They noticed them laying on the ground a short distance away) We were just thinking about going to get you two. Its a good thing you two came out here on a walk, huh?"

"Sure is." said Skipper "Could you boys excuse us for a moment?"

"OK." they answered

"Wow, would you look how fresh faced Rico is." commented Kowalski

"Tell me about it. I thought that we could tell when he was covering up his scar, but now I think that this is before he started doing that, at least in front of us anyway, for some reason. I'm not sure why and if thats the case, when did he get his scar anyway?" said Skipper Kowalski shrugged. "Anyway, got any options?" asked Skipper quickly getting back on track.

Kowalski went to check, but then he realized something: "Sweet cold fusion! I left my clipboard back at _our_ HQ." Then he whacked himself in the head.

"Don't be so hard on yourself, besides its a good change of pace, going into a mission with out a plan." said Skipper

"Well, aren't we confident." Kowalski said grinning.

"You know it." said Skipper with the swagger that he was known for. He turned back around, grinned and asked "So, Rico what kind of stuff are you packing today." Rico grinned.

Back in the tunnels the penguins were carefully making their was through looking for the intruder. Soon they found some strange indentations in the dirt in front of them. "Kowalski, analysis." said Skipper Kowalski looked at the indentations closely. He even used his wingtip to help eyeball how wide they were.

"This is going to sound strange Skipper." Kowalski said when he was finished. Skipper tilted his head at him. "They appear to be lobster tracks."

"That can't be right!" exclaimed Skipper When Kowalski didn't revise his findings he said "Boys, lets go, go, go!" he then went to go into a belly slide, but Rico grabbed him in mid-air. Skipper snapped his head around. Rico quickly put him down and after giving them a signal that said 'stay put,' he took two careful steps forward, picked up a small amount of dirt and carefully tossed it forward. When it settled the others saw what he was trying to show them: camouflaged trip wires, a primary one and a back up.

"I wonder what they are attached too." said Private

"Nothing good for tunnels, thats for sure." said Kowalski as they watched Rico use the signal that meant 'enemy explosives'.

"So, whats the plan?" asked Skipper as he stood back up. Rico suddenly spun around, grabbed him and threw him a good safe distance from the trip wires down the tunnel and before Kowalski and Private knew it he did the same to them.

"Bye bye." he said waving at them.

"I guess the plan is that he takes care of removing the enemy explosives while we track down those lobsters." said Private

"Alright, lets move." said Skipper Private and Kowalski went into a belly slide down the tunnel. "Rico, stay frosty down here." Rico gave Skipper a salute, which he returned with a grin. Then he went to catch up with the others. The three of them kept going down the tunnel in pursuit of the enemy. They stopped when they found that the ground had suddenly turned to mud.

"Thats weird." said Private

"Down there!" said Skipper pointing. They then saw what appeared to be a side tunnel. A wet side tunnel. They went over to it to give it a look.

Kowalski pulled the map out of his feathers and gave it a quick look over: "This one is not on the map, so it can't be one of ours."

"And why is it wet?" asked Private Skipper and Kowalski looked at each other and grinned and the next thing Private knew he was skidding down the sloped and muddy tunnel. When the other two heard a splash it confirmed what they strongly suspected. That being the case they couldn't help but laugh.

"Do you think that we should have warned him before we did that?" Kowalski asked still grinning.

"Nope." replied Skipper He then jumped into the tunnel himself. Kowalski shook his head in an amused way then followed when he heard Skippers splash down.

"Well, that was fun." he said after he met up with his teammates in the water filled part of the tunnel.

"Dive, dive, dive!" said Skipper The three of them swam at top speed to the end of the tunnel. It led to the duck pond in the park. They swam to the surface and hid in a clump of reeds, trying to catch their breath.

"That tunnel was starting to make me nervous." said Private

"Thats for sure." said Kowalski

"Quite down." said Skipper who was looking through the reeds and gesturing them over. Once they were flanking him he pointed to the neighboring clump of reeds where there were about five or six of Blow holes super lobsters hiding.

"Come on, lets blow the tunnels now!" said one lobster reaching for a remote that was ducked taped to the lobster next to him.

"No!" said the biggest lobster that was there. "The doc said to wait a certain amount of hours and thats what we are going to do."

"Why, hes not going to-!" began the one with the remote on his back.

"Because the doc said so, thats why!" the head lobster snapped.

"We have to get that remote." Skipper whispered to the others. "Kowalski you-" Skipper cut himself off when he saw that Private had his wing in the air. "Go ahead." said Skipper

Knowing that it would be a lot riskier if the Skipper or Kowalski he was with went to do something dangerous he came up with his own plan: "I think that I should go out first. I'll act like I need a break from you guys or something and that I'm going for a swim. If I act like I don't know that they are there they should be sneaky. When they move in to come after me you sneak up on the ones that stay behind. The one with the remote will obviously be one of them, possibly one or two of the others, but you can take them. Once you have the remote secured I break with the act, then we engage them." Kowalski and Skipper were now very impressed with Private.

"Permission granted, but I have to ask, how did you come up with that plan so fast?" said Skipper

"Uh, even I have my moments." was the only answer he could come up with. His two superiors grinned at him.

"That you do." said Kowalski

After carefully making sure that there were no humans around they let Private deploy. He strolled right up to the edge of the pond directly across from the super lobsters, making sure that he was in plain view: "I'm sure glad that Skipper surprised us with some time off. After my swim I think that I'm going to go on a snow cone run."

"That wasn't part of the plan." said one of the lobsters as they watched him dive into the pond.

"At least hes alone." said another

"All of you, get him! I'll stay and cover our trigger man here. Now go." said the head lobster

"Perfect!" Skipper said turning to Kowalski.

"Don't start gloating yet Skipper, look!" said Kowalski pointing. They saw that the lobsters weren't trying to sneak up on Private, but they were going at him full speed. The two hidden penguins could tell that they were going to try to take him out. They hoped that he caught on and fast. Fortunately one of the lobsters made the mistake of splashing his tail in the water. He saw them coming and swam for it, making it back to the edge before they got him. He went into a belly slide and made for the park, with the super lobsters in hot pursuit. Kowalski couldn't help but look at Skipper.

"He will be fine. We have a remote to secure, we'll just back him up as soon as we have it." Skipper said in an oddly low voice. The two of them snuck up behind the remote carrying lobster and his leader by land. Once in position they jumped at the two of them. Suddenly the larger lobster spun around and caught them with his claws: "Texas barbecued fish sticks!" shouted Skipper

"I knew at least one of you would be around because of that creed you go bye." said the lobster in a cocky tone.

"Never swim alone." stated Kowalski not looking at the lobster.

"What are you staring at?" asked the lobster just before Rico jumped on his back. Holding the other two captive like he was he couldn't do anything as Rico hit his weak spot knocking him out. Then he quickly hacked up his famous roll of special duct tape and stuck the two lobsters together, but he did it so Skipper could easily get the remote off of its lobster. Though the explosives were no longer in the tunnels or hooked up to trip wires the remote could still set them off. Something that was proven true when, after putting them in a safe area, Rico hit the button and they got one heck of a kaboom.

"You have perfect timing soldier." said Skipper Rico grinned.

The kaboom ended up helping Private. As he continued on, trying to shake the pursuing lobsters, he saw a tall human with a dark skin tone: "Officer X with hair? Wow!" He knew it was risky, but he made for him, hoping that he was going to be fast enough so that he would miss him and spot the lobsters. He was really hoping that it would work as the lobsters were gaining on him. Private was almost to his target when he heard the explosion.

Officer X heard it too and was turning around saying: "What was that?" When Private got to him. The small penguin tripped him as he was turning around and he ended up landing right on top of the lobsters. After he got up he tied them together and took them with him.

"Couldn't have had that work better if I had planned it." he commented from a bush right before he went to meet back up with his times Rico and this times Skipper and Kowalski.

"We were just coming to find you." said Skipper

"The lobsters have been taken care of." said Private

"Alright!" said Rico They all shared in some high fives.

"Well since you two ended up doing most of the work today why don't you two head for the base and take a load off. We still have some stuff to do." said Skipper

"Sounds good to me." said Private Rico nodded, but before they, he and Private, left them Rico informed them that there was a bit of a collapse in one of their major tunnels. Though it was fairly large it was nothing that couldn't be dealt with. He showed them where it was on the map. What Rico didn't tell them, and what Private suspected, was that Rico himself caused it to keep this Skipper and Kowalski distracted long enough for the other Skipper and Kowalski to get through the time portal. Private and Rico of course took said portal under the cover of going to HQ when the other two went to work on the aforementioned cave in.

Back at the cement truck, Skipper decided to treat this mission like it was any other. Though he did make sure to have Rico go with Kowalski and have Private stay with him, as they were going to divide and conquer. It was him and Privates job to distract the lobsters while the others were to use any means necessary to either get rid of their equipment or render it completely unusable.

So that his team could make the biggest 'impression' they could, Skipper had Rico give him some of his 'strike anywhere dynamite' before they split up. Skipper lit the place up with the dynamite before grabbing Private and using the grappling gun to swing them both in Indiana Jones style: "Alright lobsters, you have stunk up my park long enough! Now, are you going to leave quietly or should I just start melting the butter now?"

"Its two of the docs flightless foes!" said one lobster

"Quick lets take them out before the other two show up!" said another With that said all the lobsters jumped out of their human disguises and charged the two penguins.

While they fought Rico and Kowalski moved in unnoticed. They quickly gathered up all of the tools that they were using to search for the tunnels: big shovels, pick axes and the like. Which surprised and disappointed Kowalski slightly, as he was expecting more advanced stuff. They gathered them together and put them in a trash can. Then put trash over the top to hide them.

"Theres going to be one confused Central Park trash guy walking around here come tomorrow." commented Kowalski Rico grinned. "Lets get back. I'll get the others and we'll make our get away in that cement truck after you get it started. I'm sure the humans can do something about the lobsters. We'll just have to stay with the truck until they do, so don't forget to destroy their disguises." Rico nodded. Then they headed back to where the fight was still going on between their teammates and the super lobsters. Rico made for the disguises as Kowalski knocked out the lobster that had Private in one of its claws.

"Nice timing Kowalski!" said Skipper

Rico saw that one of the sticks of 'strike anywhere dynamite' that Skipper threw had been accidentally thrown unlit, so he used that to take care of the lobsters human puppet disguises after he gathered them together. He then moved on to the cement truck. He got up into the cab and was very happy to see that the keys were still in the ignition. He turned the key and was about to set the cruise control when the panel flipped completely over, like some thing in a double-o-seven spy car.

"That can't be good." thought Rico

He was right as a computer voice said "Dr. Blow holes tamper proof protocol has been activated. If you are authorized to use this vehicle then place a claw on this screen in the next twenty seconds, if your not then I suggest that you run, if you can escape that is. Have a nice day." The locks on the doors engaged, but luckily he left the door he came in open. Rico immediately jumped out of the cab just as the timer appeared. He met his team on the ground, used the 'enemy explosives' signal then pointed at the truck.

"Evacuee team!" shouted Skipper They went into a belly slide behind him and went in the opposite direction of the super lobsters. They didn't get to far before the truck went up. The shock wave hit them and they were sent flying. (The lobsters stayed where they were, but ducked) They used their trademark flips to compensate and land safely. Weather it was his shape or the angle it hit him, Kowalski wasn't as successful as the others. He hit the ground hard and was instantly dazed, though still awake for the moment.

Rico, who was the closest went to go and get him to safety. Just as Skipper turned to Private and told him to get somewhere safe and that he and the boys would be right behind him when a piece of flying debris hit Rico, knocking him down. No one saw what or where it hit him, there was no time as there was some big part of the truck about to land on the immobile Kowalski. Skipper whipped around just in time to throw Rico the grappling gun. Rico fired it in Kowalskis direction. It didn't quite make it to him, but when he pushed off the ground he slid close enough to bite down on the cable. The last thing that The options guy saw was Rico wrenching on said cable. Though, to the semiconscious Kowalski, it looked like he was being careful not to display his left side.

Kowalski was sleeping in the topmost bunk on his back. He looked a bit unsettled, as his face was scrunched up and his wings twitched slightly. Suddenly he took a deep breath, opened his eyes and had to fight the compulsion to sit bolt upright as he didn't want to slam his head on the ceiling of the space he was in. He took another deep calming breath before he sat up just enough to see the rest of the room: Skipper was on one side of the room dressed up in his cowboy outfit and looking at himself in the mirror, Rico was making his secret recipe sushi and Private was watching one of his favorite unicorn themed TV shows.

"Nothing out of the-" he cut that thought off as his eyes bulged and he started breathing rapidly. "Oh sweet mercy! We didn't do something wrong and get trapped in a time loop did we?" he yelled leaning out of the bunk so much that he fell. He landed on his front on the floor of the base. The team turned around when he yelled.

"Are you alright?" asked Private Kowalski didn't get the chance to answer him.

"Morning greetings from your Beloved King Julian slap happy penguins!" shouted the lemur as he let himself in through the hatch and flipped down the latter. Skipper was quick to get out of his cowboy outfit and there was a loud smashing sound. (Theres another seven years for The Skipper)

"Julian!" Kowalski shouted jumping up and grabbing him by his tail.

"What are you doing?" he asked looking unnerved by the tall penguins odd behavior.

"Your here!" exclaimed Kowalski looking like he was sugar high. "We fixed it!"

"Skipper be calling him off, he is scaring me!" said Julian leaning away from Kowalski.

"Simmer down, Kowalski." said Skipper tossing him his options clipboard. On reflex he let go of The Lemur King and caught it. Julian jumped away from Kowalski and stood behind Private, him being the farthest away from the tech savvy penguin. "Yes, the time stream is fixed, but perhaps it wasn't broken in the first place." Skipper pointed at the clipboard as he spoke.

Kowalski tilted his head at him then looked down, his normal calm attitude returning. He saw a picture of a unicorn jumping over a rainbow, when he flipped the picture he saw a sizable pink pony sticker on the back. "Huh, well what do you know?" Kowalski grinned, a grin which broadened when a thought occurred to him: "Hey Private, weren't you looking for a drawing the other day?"

"Yeah, but I didn't find it." he answered

"No, but _we_ did." said Kowalski throwing the clipboard over to him.

"Huh, go figure." was the only thing he could think to say. Julian looked at him with an expression that clearly said that he knew that he was out of the loop, but that didn't stop him from checking out Privates artwork.

"Thats almost as cute as I am." he said

"Thanks, I think." said Private

"Well, I do not call you 'The cute one' for nothing." Julian replied Private grinned at him.

"Skipper, could I talk to you for a second?" asked Kowalski

"Alright." The two of them walked over to the bottom of the latter.

"What happened after I passed out?"

"Thats easy, Rico, uh that it 'past Rico' pulled you to safety. Then we met up with 'past Private' in another big bush. Once we gave you a look over to make sure that you were alright I ordered them to go back to the base and chill and said that we would comeback when you woke up." answered Skipper

"Then you carried me to the time portal?" asked Kowalski

"Well, almost. See when that cement truck blew it of course attracted a lot of attention. I sent Private and Rico to the base before to many humans showed up to make it less likely for us to be seen and watched what happened. Fire fighters and police of course turned up, as well as people who were just curious. Once most of them were gone I made my move and came back to our _present_ location."

"And super lobsters?"

"Officer X, with hair, came, caught them and said that they were headed for the Hoboken Zoo." Skipper grinned

"Its always Hoboken." Kowalski said also grinning. "Did anything else happen?"

"Well do you remember when Private said that if you built a Chronotron to counteract Blow holes that it might pick up on its signal?"

"Yeah." answered Kowalski realizing now that he, and obviously the others, now remembered the entire adventure, with the exception of the part when he was out cold. He wasn't sure how that worked, but for once he didn't want to know. What Skipper had said before, about how the time line 'wasn't broken in the first place' sufficed.

"As it goes, Blow hole built two of them. My guess is thats how he got to London and the Chronotron that was there was sent as a build by numbers kit type of thing for the lobsters that were sent to set up for the operation that we stopped there."

"So where was the first one?" asked Kowalski

"Coney Island." said Skipper "We went there right after we put you in your bunk." Kowalski blinked at him. "That mine mission was almost to easy. That Chronotron was also the one that made it so the lobsters could wreck our tunnels. We got in, took it apart just like the other one and came back here to see you still in your bunk."

"So I have been out cold for about a day?" asked Kowalski confused.

"You were the most stressed out of all of us, so it makes sense to me." shrugged Skipper

"So Skipper, you didn't bye any chance notice anything about 'past Rico' when you ordered him and 'past Private' back to the base did you?" Kowalski asked

"I don't think so, why?"

"I just thought that I saw him standing in a really weird way after he got hit, though I was semi-conscience at the time." Kowalski shrugged As did Skipper.

"When do you think Rico stopped covering up that scar of his anyway? I mean I remember Christmas that year, which we had to stay for because of the cave in we had to fix. The one when we had to save Private from the crazy toy poodle Mr. Chew, he didn't cover it up in front of us, but when Alex or somebody else showed up and sometimes when we left the base he would cover it up with his feathers and make up. Like when we were traveling around, Madagascar or Alexs old turf are prime examples. Now though, he doesn't seem to care who sees it." Skipper said as he observed Rico standing next to Julian as he and Private talked about the plans they were making for Marlenes surprise birthday party that weekend.

"Your wondering about when he stopped being self conscience about it." said Kowalski Skipper nodded. "I really couldn't tell you. Its just something that happened somewhere along line."

"Where do you think he got the make up he used to use anyway?" asked Skipper Kowalski gave him a look. "What? I'm just curious."

"I couldn't tell you that either." said Kowalski

The two penguins stood and watched the others for a moment. Private was trying to get Julian to do something for the party, but he refused. Private then used his sad puppy dog face, The ring tail wilted and off course agreed to Privates plan.

"Thats it, no more hanging out with Mort for you." said Julian pointing at Private, who laughed. Rico grinned and hacked up a score card to mark this little victory down. The score card indicated that Private and Mort were currently tied for 'Zoos Cutest'. Now a friendly competition between the two of them, they mostly liked to mess with Julian much to the amusement of everyone else.

"Hey Kowalski, do you think there was a lesson in that whole time traveling adventure?" Skipper asked suddenly.

"The only thing that I can think of is that you should never get to used to the status quo because you never know when it might change in a very big way." Kowalski answered

"I'll buy that." said Skipper "I guess Private was right, The options guy dose know everything or at the very least almost everything."

Kowalski grinned then said "Sorry, that we used another Chronotron and you still didn't get to slap a hippie."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that. The day is still young after all, plus your Chronotron is only as far as your lab." said Skipper grinning.

"And what dose that mean?" asked Kowalski thinking that Skipper was up to something.

**The End**

~_Authors Note:__ An episode like ending, ain't I a stinker? (Grins evilly) I hoped that you liked this. If you want you can review, but as always the case with me: no flames! I had a lot fun writing this, though it was a very hard story to get right. I had to write parts over again on more then one occasion. In case you are wondering about some things here are the answers: __One__: I used the lines from the beginning of movie two because to me they never seemed to fit, so I made them fit. __Two__: The cave in that Rico caused as a distraction for 'past Skipper and Kowalski' was the one that Skipper refers to in the beginning of movie one. __Three__: I did that thing with Ricos scar because he has it in the original penguins Christmas special: A Christmas Caper and on the show, but he dose not have it in the movies or the second Christmas special: Merry Madagascar. I was trying to explain why that is, he was self conscience about it. Also, I made it a bit of a mystery at the __same time, as in it could have happened then but we don't know for sure because at present I have not seen movie three. So, I hope that I answered all of your questions. If I haven't then send me the inquiry along with your reviews. Last, but not least I would like to give the normal disclaimer which I put down here because I can: I do not own The Penguins Of Madagascar or any of the Madagascar movies Dream Works/Nickelodeon dose.~_

_~Over & Out~ _


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